THE ELEPHANT

Claire picks up the phone, and suddenly her world turns upside down: her father is hospital, in a coma. Except that: Claire doesn't have a father. Finding out that you have a father, at 39 years old: this is the strange experience that Claire has. After a short phase of denial, Claire realizes the obvious, and, scared to the core, decides to meet this stranger. While the man is on the verge of death and everything is turned upside down, "life" continues: the children, work, friends… The Elephant is a rare story, incredibly airy, modest, sensitive, and devoid of the slightest gram of pathos; Isabelle Pralong advances in minefield with the lightness of a feather, and thanks to his drawing recognizable among thousands, thanks to such a skillful sense of writing that inventive and tinged with humor, it transforms what could have been a drama weighing down on a great moment of humanity. Published in 2007 and never reissued, winner of the Töpffer Prize and the Révélation Prize in Angoulême, L'Eléphant was not no longer available for about fifteen years. It is at Atrabile that the chef Isabelle Pralong's work is finally making a comeback, and this book, which has nothing lost its strength, is adorned for the occasion with a new engraving and a format significantly larger.